Posts Tagged ‘chet’

Sometimes – and they’re often the best times in what my grandmother always called “the writing game” – a character grabs you and won’t let go. This character – a figment of your own imagination but not wholly under your power – demands to be brought to life, and in the case of LeAnne Hogan, the main character in THE RIGHT SIDE (coming June 27), will bring herself to life with or without your help. So – I helped! By now I’ve written many novels, but never one like this, neither in the experience of the writing or in the resulting novel. There’s a take-off point in any novel (except bad ones), a moment somewhere along the line where the story becomes airborne. In the case of THE RIGHT SIDE, I had the feeling of being airborne even before the start, like one of those high-flying planes that separates from the belly of a bomber at fifty thousand feet.

LeAnne’s a warrior, although I wouldn’t call her a lover of war. She’s more of a protector, a lover of duty, the tip of a necessary spear most of us prefer not to think about. LeAnne said things that surprised me, amazed me, shocked me at times, and I wasn’t even sure what I thought of her until the very last few lines. My favorite ending of any of my books: am I allowed to say that?

Duty, war, damage external and internal, trust, love: they’re all important in THE RIGHT SIDE. There’s also the smell of Afghanistan in a stateside closet, a secret affair, a missing child – and a dog. Not a narrating dog, and to give the dog’s name here would be a spoiler. I can say this dog has a powerful personality, and a deeply mysterious soul. THE RIGHT SIDE is different from the Chet and Bernie novels, but I believe C&B fans will like it just as much – or more! – if in a somewhat different way.

Count Dracula appeared right in our house! Walking down the hall with his arms raised up high! He was way taller than I’d imagined. Of course I attacked him right away – homeland security is my job. But it was only Bernie – I found out just a bit too late – trying on his Halloween costume. No one told me Halloween was coming. I like all the holidays – Thanksgiving especially – but not Halloween. What gets into people on Halloween? You tell me.

“No one tells me to chill,” Thurman said. And all at once he took a big roundhouse swing at Crash. I wouldn’t have thought Crash capable of moving real fast, but he was. He ducked, just like that, almost quicker than I could see. I’ve only had one encounter with a duck, and it didn’t duck at all, attacked me, in fact, so I don’t get the ducking thing; but that’s another story. Thurman swung. Crash ducked. And Thurman’s huge fist caught Disco square on the chin. He toppled over and lay still.

Thurman moved on Crash. Crash backed away, ending up against the RV, no place to go. “A hundred and seventy-five bucks or you’re next,” he said.

“Don’t have that kind of bread right now,” Crash said. “And this is a real bad time for you to – “

“Then I’m takin’ the dog,” Thurman said. He wheeled around toward me. I growled. I hated the choke chain and never forgot things like that.

Bernie moved slightly, stepping between me and Thurman. “When did this happen?” he said.

“None of your business. Take my word for it.”

“And where?”

“Don’t hear too good, do you, pal?” said Thurman.

“Anywhere near Red Butte, by any chance?” Bernie said.

“You lookin’ for trouble?” Thurman’s eye twitch got going.

“Trouble’s already here,” Bernie said. “Now the only question is how it gets handled.”

Down on the ground, Disco moaned and began to stir.

“You’ll get handled, you don’t get out of my way,” said Thurman.

Bernie didn’t budge. “And I hear just fine, by the way,” he said. Huh? Bernie really thought that? “Sharp enough to pick up the sound of a loser.”

Thurman’s mouth opened. All that black hairy beard and then a very red tongue in the middle: it had a strange effect on me, made me feel like scrapping. At the same time, I noticed Crash sidling toward the cab of the RV. I sidled over with him. He looked at me and mouthed some word. Mouthed, like with no sound. What was I supposed to make of that? I had enough trouble with ordinary sounded-out words; if you weren’t careful, you could get impatient with humans sometimes. I showed Crash my teeth, didn’t know what else to do. He stopped sidling.

Admin: to see the Little Detective Agency business card, please scroll down to January 16.

The tall blond guy took a ball from the bucket and hit it to Ganz. Ganz wore white shorts, had skinny legs like sticks. He swung his racquet and hit the ball back. The tall guy let it go by, took out another ball. “Brush up, Shermie, brush up. Spin on the ball, always spin on the ball.” He hit the ball over the net. Ganz swung, this time missing the ball completely. “Brush up but through, up but through, up but through,” said the tall guy, sending over another ball. Brush? I knew brushes, saw none around. Maybe tennis was tougher than it looked, but I didn’t worry about that because a ball came bouncing over in our direction – we were now beside the court – and I snatched it out of the air, and who wouldn’t have, the ball being right there practically saying, “Catch me.” And then – this part was a bit harder to understand – I was on the court, racing toward the net. Up and over: not much of a challenge, tennis nets turning out not to be very high, but still it felt so great, being airborne and all, that I kind of twisted around still up there, if you see what I mean, and landed facing back at the net, and the next thing I knew I was jumping over it again, from the other direction, and, yes! doing the spin move once more, and when I landed this time, somehow with two balls in my mouth now – how had that happened? – I –

“Chet!”

From Admin – for all those who requested Little Detective Agency business cards (see January 16 post) the process for getting them to you has started. Anyone who doesn’t have one in say, 10 days or so, please get back to spence.quinn@gmail.com. Same email for new requesters.